Maryannaville™

Zina Saunders

BP stopped the oil leak! They put a giant wedding ring around it and all of a sudden it just stopped putting out!
And in other news:

Take a few minutes to drop in to tell Maryannaville’s good mate Deborah Happy Birthday!

Git on, Girlfriend!

Originally posted 2007-06-21 16:05:00. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

For my granddaughter Ceresse for Music Monday.  Although beautiful, Shakira can’t hold a candle next to you.

“I often struggle to find words that will communicate the vastness of the Pacific Ocean to people who have never been to sea. Day after day, Alguita was the only vehicle on a highway without landmarks, stretching from horizon to horizon. Yet as I gazed from the deck at the surface of what ought to have been a pristine ocean, I was confronted, as far as the eye could see, with the sight of plastics.”

It seemed unbelievable, but I never found a clear spot. In the week it took to cross the subtropical high, no matter what time of day I looked, plastics debris was floating everywhere: bottles, bottle caps, wrappers, fragments. Months later, after I discussed what I had seen with the oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer, perhaps the world’s leading expert on flotsam, he began referring to the area as the ‘eastern garbage patch.’ But ‘patch’ doesn’t begin to convey the reality. Ebbesmeyer has estimated that the area, nearly covered with floating plastic debris, is roughly the size of Texas.”

Excerpt from ‘Trashed: across the Pacific Ocean, plastics, plastics, everywhere’, Natural History, Nov, 2003 by Charles Moore

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, at Wikipedia.

Kudos to Pip Wilson for the tip

Pip interjects:
(Note to Australian readers: that’s a ‘patch’ of plastic flotsam almost a quarter the size of the State of Western Australia, and nearly as large as New South Wales.)

Originally posted 2007-02-25 18:25:00. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Dips me Bonnet to: The Billy Vega$ Show

Courtesy of Information Clearing House

Originally posted 2007-07-18 17:54:00. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Pundits for some time have speculated that YouTube will be the next Napster … sort of a video Napster in some ways. That prediction may have come true. Internet video sharing Web site YouTube.com recently found itself a defendant in a copyright infringement lawsuit. The case was filed by “Tur,” the journalist who shot video footage of the 1992 Los Angeles riots, including the beating of Reginald Denny. Tur alleges YouTube.com permits users to post videos including his copyrighted footage on the YouTube site without his permission. Whether Grokster kills or Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and/or the DMCA save YouTube is to be seen.

Publish Article, Arstechnica Article, EFF FAQ on Section 230, MTV.com Article

Originally posted 2006-07-31 13:54:00. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Spend all that money sending you to school and this is what you did last weekend Texas GOP?

Mercy sakes alive!

Today also commemorates the death of my late husband. Although I disbelieve in fairy tales, he was every bit my real life Prince Charming. To date, I’ve yet to meet anyone who could hold a candle next to him. I seriously doubt that I ever will.

Just saying.

Music for Music Monday

In light of the many folks who bought in to the Megan Had It Coming blog and spewed their personal hate issues on the blog, there was a whole lot of issues on it that just didn’t settle well with me. Then again, I’m not a vigilante. There was more to it than what appeared in text. I simply couldn’t articulate it therefore, I listened to my inner wisdom and held my peace. I really don’t want to link to it but for the sake of my readers convenience, this post isn’t about me, it’s about readership and for online readers personal edification and application.

Many got taken in by it. The exorbitant amount of comments primarily consisted of folks whose intent and purpose was to work out their own personal issues whether they were cognizant of it or not. Many made it a full time job to spew their hatefulness. Some even personalized many of the comments. It was another cruel online charade. This was done at the expense of not only Megan Meier and her family, overall, it was set up by an opportunist who took full advantage of a very painful situation. Moreover, it simply amazes me how intentionally cruel human beings can be toward one another. I’m sure that many who vomited their own vile won’t even give it a second thought.

Everyone who bit into this hoax got taken in like the fools they are. There were countless amounts of posts that even announced that the damn thing was nothing but a hoax yet people will believe only what they want to believe. Everyone got played like a fiddle. There were no victims other than Megan Meier’s family and the Drew family. And just think, you, the ones who just had to take a dump on it were the guilty participants. So tell me, who exactly is who?

Was it a cruel and malicious power play? Was it an emotionally driven form of manipulation? You bet it was, on both counts.
See The Final Story

The only good news in this is that there was a life lesson taught but you’ll have to look within yourself to find it. It’s my hope that you are brave enough to take a look at it, learn from it, and then apply the lesson to your life. Who knows, this lesson may very well save your life someday, that is if you study this lesson really long and hard.
Take the exam

‘The First Amendment is often inconvenient. But that is besides the point. Inconvenience does not absolve the government of its obligation to tolerate speech.’
~ Justice Anthony Kennedy, US Supreme Court Justice 1987

Related:
CDT|Communications Decency Act
Crime Space
R.I.P. Megan Meier
15 Styles of Distorted Thinking
An excellent YouTube example of what distorted thinking is like created by tylersmyler

Originally posted 2007-12-10 08:46:00. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Visit the Atheist Solidarity website before the 21st of June and snag a ribbon of your choice. June 21st is the day to celebrate.

Description removed from the Facebook page:

This is a simple campaign with one main objective: to have atheists everywhere on Facebook put a tiny atheist solidarity ribbon (one side black other side scarlet red) on their profile image to identify themselves as an atheist. It doesn’t have to be big or distracting. It could be just a tiny little ribbon in the corner.

This campaign WILL:

-*ELIMINATE STEREOTYPES* about atheists as others see and recognize atheists all throughout Facebook
-Show others that *ATHEISTS ARE EVERYWHERE* and come with many different personalities and from all around the world
-Provide a means to other atheists who feel it necessary to hide their atheism to *FEEL MORE COMFORTABLE COMING OUT* as others around him/her come out
-Help *UNITE ATHEISTS*, as it will be easier to find others who are also atheists

This group’s photo section will be used as a collection of user contributed renditions of the ribbon only. This collection could then be used as a place where atheists can pick a style of ribbon that best fits onto their profile picture.

To get atheist ribbon pictures with transparent backgrounds so you can easily add it on top of profile pictures see: http://bit.ly/aQ8goS

Be sure to invite others to the group. We want every Atheist on Facebook involved in the campaign, the more the merrier.

The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings but shorter tempers, wider freeways, but narrower viewpoints. We spend more, but have less; we buy more, but enjoy less. We have bigger houses and smaller families, more conveniences, but less time. We have more degrees but less sense, more knowledge, but less judgment, more experts, yet more problems, more medicine, but less wellness.

We drink too much, smoke too much, spend too recklessly, laugh too little, drive too fast, get too angry, stay up too late, get up too tired, read too little, watch TV too much, and pray too seldom. We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often.

We’ve learned how to make a living, but not a life. We’ve added years to life not life to years. We’ve been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet a new neighbor. We conquered outer space but not inner space.

We’ve done larger things, but not better things. We’ve cleaned up the air, but polluted the soul. We’ve conquered the atom, but not our prejudice.

We write more, but learn less. We plan more, but accomplish less.

We’ve learned to rush, but not to wait. We build more computers to hold more information, to produce more copies than ever, but we communicate less and less.

These are the times of fast foods and slow digestion, big men and small character, steep profits and shallow relationships. These are the days of two incomes but more divorce, fancier houses, but broken homes.

These are days of quick trips, disposable diapers, throwaway morality, one night stands, overweight bodies, and pills that do everything from cheer, to quiet, to kill.

It is a time when there is much in the showroom window and nothing in the stockroom. A time when technology can bring this letter to you, and a time when you can choose either to share this insight, or to just hit delete.

George Carlin

Music for Music Monday

The dictionary defines power as “control and influence exercised over others.”
With positions of management and leadership comes power and it seems to sit more comfortably with some than others. It is increasingly recognized that organizations need good leaders if they are to go forward successfully. Its people will feel motivated, empowered, and want to contribute.

Leaders who are not using their power positively and abusing it will act in a way which will be coercive and, in extremes, could be bullying. This latter situation is one which appears to be on the increase and is creating further problems in the workplace such as stress. Most companies look at the definition of “power” and how it can be used productively. Moreover, companies also will want to consider how leaders can become more confident in their positions and with their power as well as explore the benefits for all parties concerned when it does make its considerations.

Originally posted 2006-07-10 23:50:00. Republished by Blog Post Promoter